Why You Need to Be Building a Product

“It’s okay to be in the service industry, but building a product is where the money’s at.” These wise words come from a trusted advisor who was encouraging me to think deeper about building income streams.

I can’t say that he’s wrong. In fact, if I were to calculate sales of the ebook I launched last month, I’d have a healthier bank account at this very moment. True, not everyone who downloaded the book for free would pay for the same thing. But many would and, at $9 or $10 a pop, that would be a good payday.

I’ve stressed this elsewhere, but I believe we’re at a point where people will need to build multiple revenue streams to excel. Not just survive, any desk job with a paycheck can help you do that. But really, truly, honestly excel to the point where you get to do some really cool things.

Does this frighten you? Have you seen this at work in your own life? When I sit down and look at where I have income coming in, here’s what I find:

Amazon affiliates

A salary and a stipend

Small contracting projects

The occasional speaking gig (although, these are becoming less and less frequent because of the extensive speaking we do at Monk)

I see a gaping hole in there for product. Product development is where I’m focusing a lot of my thought and energy, as it’s the key to my financial freedom. Yours too.

Here are a few ideas I’ve toyed around with:

Continue writing ebooks, both free and paid.

Develop a physical product that benefits remote/virtual workers.

Develop social media and productivity resources.

Build the ever-elusive app.

Time will tell if any of these will get past the planning stages, but I’m gearing my thinking this way. I think you should too. After all, few of us actually push ourselves to our limits. So why not give it a go?

This is all an experiment. I’d love to hear how yours is going. Let me know in the comments below and we can learn together!